Barrow (Ring Barrow), Cahermakerrila, Co. Clare

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Barrows

Barrow (Ring Barrow), Cahermakerrila, Co. Clare

A prehistoric burial mound sitting quietly at the top of a low ridge in County Clare, this ring-barrow at Cahermakerrila has managed to survive intact within a forest plantation that pressed right up to its edges but, tellingly, did not swallow it.

The trees stop short of the monument, leaving it in a small clearing of its own, with Slieve Elva visible to the north-west and the wider Burren plateau spread out below.

A ring-barrow is a burial monument, typically of Bronze Age date, consisting of a low central mound enclosed by a surrounding ditch and an outer earthen bank. The example here is subcircular in plan, measuring roughly 41.7 metres north to south and 38.7 metres east to west at its fullest extent. The central mound is gently domed, rising between 0.6 and 0.8 metres above the surrounding ground, and is encircled by a flat-bottomed fosse, a term for the ditch cut around such monuments, averaging between 2.5 and 3.7 metres wide and about 0.3 to 0.4 metres deep. Rushes have taken hold in the fosse, which is noticeably wider at the south, opening to around 5 metres, and narrows considerably at the north. Beyond the fosse runs an outer bank, best preserved along the eastern and western stretches; the northern arc has largely flattened into the ground. Two gaps in the outer bank, one at the south-east measuring 6.5 metres and one at the north-west at 7.5 metres, are considered likely later intrusions rather than original features of the design. The monument was recorded as an enclosure in the Record of Monuments and Places in 1996, a classification that somewhat undersells what it actually is.

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